Background: Several infectious lung diseases often develop in patients with Rheumatoid arthritis (RA), especially during immunosuppressive medication, including disease-modifying anti-rheumatic drugs (DMARDs). The present study aimed to determine the role of respiratory tract bacterial infection in RA activity. Methods: Blood and sputum samples were collected from 31 patients with RA and 12 healthy subjects as control. The bacterial isolates were isolated and identified in collected sputum by biochemical tests and Vitec 2 system. Results: In the present study, thirty-one patients with RA were compared with 12 healthy subjects. Eight patients with RA were not infected with pathogenic bacteria (RA-NIPB) (25.8%). Twenty-three RA patients were infected with pathogenic bacteria (RA-IPB) (74.19%). From 23 RA-IPB, 10 RA patients were infected with Staphylococcus aureus, 6 RA patients were infected with Klebsiella pneumonia, 4 RA patients were infected with Streptococcus pneumoniae, and 3 RA patients were infected with Pseudomonas aeruginosa. No pathogenic bacteria were isolated from the sputum of a healthy subjects. There was no significant difference between RA-NIPB and RA-IPB in terms of the level of disease activity score DAS28. Conclusion: The current study showed that patients with RA have a higher incidence of being infected with pathogenic bacteria than the healthy control group. No significant effect of bacterial species infection on the level of DAS28. The present study is the pioneer study that showed no effect of bacterial respiratory infections and different RA treatments on RA disease activity.
The aim was to design a MATLAB program to calculate the phreatic surface of the multi-well system and present the graphical shape of the water table drawdown induced by water extraction. Dupuit’s assumption is the base for representing the dewatering curve. The program will offer the volume of water to be extracted, the total number of wells, and the spacing between them as well as the expected settlement of soil surrounding the dewatering foundation pit. The dewatering well arrangement is required in execution works, and it needs more attention due to the settlement produced from increasing effective stress.
Transdermal drug delivery has made an important contribution to medical practice but has yet to fully achieve its potential as an alternative to oral delivery and hypodermic injections. Transdermal therapeutic systems have been designed to provide controlled continuous delivery of drugs through the skin to the systemic circulation. A transdermal patch is an adhesive patch that has a coating of drug; the patch is placed on the skin to deliver particular amount of drug into the systemic circulation over a period of time. The transdermal drug delivery systems (TDDS) review articles provide information regarding the transdermal drug delivery systems and its evaluation process as a ready reference for the research scientist who is involved
... Show MoreThe paper deals with the traveling wave cylindrical heating systems. The analysis presented is analytical and a multi-layer model using cylindrical geometry is used to obtain the theoretical results. To validate the theoretical results, a practical model is constructed, tested and the results are compared with the theoretical ones. Comparison showed that the adopted analytical method is efficient in describing the performance of such induction heating systems.
This paper studies the adaptive coded modulation for coded OFDM system using punctured convolutional code, channel estimation, equalization and SNR estimation. The channel estimation based on block type pilot arrangement is performed by sending pilots at every sub carrier and using this estimation for a specific number of following symbols. Signal to noise ratio is estimated at receiver and then transmitted to the transmitter through feedback channel ,the transmitter according to the estimated SNR select appropriate modulation scheme and coding rate which maintain constant bit error rate
lower than the requested BER. Simulation results show that better performance is confirmed for target bit error rate (BER) of (10-3) as compared to c
In this work the design and construction of optical pumping system was presented. The parameters of the pumping source to obtain discharge current density sufficient to shift the flash lamp spectrum towards uv portion of spectrum were measured.The current density was supplied to the flash lamp must be greater than 4000Amp./cm2 to obtain the spectral range wavelength lies between 0.2 and 0.35?m. The current density was obtained by a capacitor 50?F, at 7KV discharge voltage. The applied electrical energy to the flash lamp was more than 1200 J, and the current density was around 5000 Amp./cm2.The electrical parameters of the flash lamp were calculated. The impedance parameters(K0) from the voltage and the peak current pulse was measured in ran
... Show More In this work a Nd:YVO4 thin disc laser setup is designed and fabricated. The disk laser system
is designed to be compact. The laser crystal was pumped by a 808 nm diode laser. The effect of input
current and pulse frequency on the output energy at pulse operation mode, and the effect of the input
current on the output power at CW mode operation are tested. At the pulsed mode, the output energy
increased linearly with the input current and decreased with pulse frequency. The threshold current
increased with increasing pulse frequency increasing. The maximum output energy from the thin disc
laser was 0.98 μJ at 1.3 kHz frequency, with 0.49A. A minimum threshold current for CW mode of
operation. The maximum outpu
With the high usage of computers and networks in the current time, the amount of security threats is increased. The study of intrusion detection systems (IDS) has received much attention throughout the computer science field. The main objective of this study is to examine the existing literature on various approaches for Intrusion Detection. This paper presents an overview of different intrusion detection systems and a detailed analysis of multiple techniques for these systems, including their advantages and disadvantages. These techniques include artificial neural networks, bio-inspired computing, evolutionary techniques, machine learning, and pattern recognition.
Rotating fan shaft system was investigated experimentally and theoretically to study its dynamic performance. The type of oil used for the bearing was taken in consideration during the experimental program .Three types of oil were used, SAE 40, SAE 50 and degraded oil. During the experiments, the fan blades stagger angle was changed through angles (20˚, 30˚, 40˚, and 50˚). The shaft rotational speed also changed in the range of (0-3000 rpm). All these parameters have investigated for two cases (balanced and unbalanced fan). The performance parameters of the fan were found experimentally by measuring the fan, volume flow rate, Reynolds and Strouhal numbers, efficiency and pressure head. Analytical part was also represented to prepare
... Show MoreThe earth's surface comprises different kinds of land cover, water resources, and soil, which create environmental factors for varied animals, plants, and humans. Knowing the significant effects of land cover is crucial for long-term development, climate change modeling, and preserving ecosystems. In this research, the Google Earth Engine platform and freely available Landsat imagery were used to investigate the impact of the expansion and degradation in urbanized areas, watersheds, and vegetative cover on the land surface temperature in Baghdad from 2004 to 2021. Land cover indices such as the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index, Normalized Difference Water Index, and Normalized Difference Built-up Index (NDVI, NDWI, an
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